amarhealth.com

Health Desk: 26 January 2018: Bangladesh has ranked 10th among the Asian countries based on the number of deaths from HIV/AIDS in 2016, says the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS).

According to the recently released UNAIDS report 2017, around 1,000 people died in Bangladesh in 2016 due to AIDS.

A data comparison from 2016 of South Asian countries shows, India has the highest number of deaths from AIDS – 62,000 – while Bangladesh is behind Pakistan (5,500 deaths) and Nepal (1,700 deaths).

Screenshot of a graph from UNAIDS website shows the data on HIV deaths in South Asian countries

Sri Lanka has seen around 110 deaths and 360 people died in Afghanistan due to the disease in the same year, according to the report.

Around 12,000 people who have contracted HIV are currently living in Bangladesh. Of them, 7,500 are male and aged 15 or above, according to UNAIDS data. Also, about 1,500 have been newly affected by the disease.

Around 7,900 people, within the age of 17, have been orphaned due to the disease.

However, only 1,800 AIDS affected people in the country are receiving antiretroviral therapy (ART).

According to UNAIDS, an estimated 5.1 million in the Asia Pacific region are living with HIV at present while only 2.4 million have access to treatment. Data on China is not available.

India has the third largest population of people with HIV after South Africa and Nigeria.